MACAULAY'S 263
descriptions of character In which satirists and historians
indulge so much. It is by rejecting what is natural that
satirists and historians produce these striking characters.
Their great object generally is to ascribe to every man as
many contradictory qualities as possible : and this is an
object easily attained. By judicious selection and judicious
exaggeration, the intellect and the disposition of any human
being might be described as being made up of nothing but
startling contrasts. If the dramatist attempts to create a
being answering to one of these descriptions^ he fails be-
cause he reverses an imperfect analytical process. He pro*
duces, not a man, but a personified epigram. Very eminent
writers have fallen into this snare.1
Macaulay here couples together historians and satirists,
as if it were natural and correct that historians should use
the same method as satirists. But the truth is that in draw-
ing characters the historian ought to endeavour to imitate
the method of the dramatist. He should note externals but
pierce through them. He should not heighten contradic-
tions, but should try to discover their cause and explain
them.
Political prejudice, exaggeration, and want of real in-
sight combine to produce the misrepresentations of certain
historical characters to be found in Macaulay's pages.
Three cases are chosen here to exhibit his failings. All three
have been exhaustively treated in Paget's New Examen,2
Macaulay styles Dundee ca soldier of distinguished
courage and professional skill, but rapacious and profane*
of violent temper and of obdurate heart/ 3 Another passage
refers to his * seared conscience and adamantine heart/ *
Then are recapitulated the crimes by which he and others
1 Essays, i. 334.
2 Included in Paradoxes and Puzzles,
* I, 492 (iv). * I, 493-